All water heaters known to Applicant require an external source of power, such as a line voltage, natural gas source, or a battery that must be recharged. Such water heaters are disadvantageous as they are not suitable for extended uses away from these respective external sources of power, and cannot, for example, be powered by a user.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,809,856 to Wills discusses an exemplary water heater that utilizes a pair of electrodes through which current can pass to heat water flowing between the electrodes. To change the temperature of the outflowing water, the distance between the electrodes is changed. Although this change in distance can be automatic, Wills contemplates that a handcrank could be used to manually vary the water's temperature. However, the Wills water heater is powered from an external source of gas or electricity, and thereby suffers from the same disadvantages discussed above.
It is also known to utilize a hand crank to generate a limited amount of power, such as for a radio or flashlight. However, Applicant is unaware of any user-powered devices that impart heat to water.
Thus, there is still a need for user-powered water heater.